AT SPIRAX SARCO

More than 50 delegates from manufacturing companies across the region attended Business & Innovation Magazine’s latest Manufacturing Live event.

The event was hosted by Spirax Sarco, Cheltenham’s largest manufacturing employer and a world leading manufacturer of products for the control and use of steam and other industrial fluids.

Guest speaker was Dr Andy Jones, the Manufacturing Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund Director of Innovate UK, part of UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).

Paul Oakley, Supply Chain Director at Spirax Sarco for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, kicked off the event by giving an overview of the company.

The company’s global headquarters are in Cheltenham and it employs more than 1,000 employees across its two sites in the town. Globally, the Spirax Sarco steam business employs in excess of 4,250 people. The company was first established more than 130 years ago and quickly became a specialist manufacturer of steam traps. Today, the company produces the widest range of specialist industrial steam equipment in the world.

UKRI is the government’s national funding agency investing in science and research in the UK. Operating across the whole country, with a combined budget of more than £6 billion, UKRI brings Innovate UK together the research councils and Research England.

In addition to its Cheltenham site, Spirax Sarco, which is part of the FTSE 100 company Spirax-Sarco Engineering plc, has manufacturing centres around the world.

Despite not sounding very high tech, steam is still by far the most efficient way of transferring heat energy into industrial processes. The other most prevalent technology able to do that is electricity, between them providing up to 80 per cent of all industrial heating requirements.

Steam can heat or sterilise almost any industrial process. From food producing to oil refining, beer making to drug manufacturing, steam delivers safe, sustainable and efficient energy transfer and continues to evolve.

“This diversification of our markets benefits the business as when one global industrial activity weakens, it is balanced by customers in other sectors,” said Paul.

Spirax Sarco designs, manufactures and sells products across the whole steam and condensate loop. For example, it makes the systems, controls and valves that are required on an industrial steam distribution system and is the world leader in this sector by far.

Together with smaller sister company, Getsra, Spirax-Sarco Engineering’s steam business reported revenues of more than £730 million last year. The company invests significantly in research and development and has been voted one of Britain’s “Most Admired Companies”.

Investing in research and development to drive up UK productivity

The average percentage of gross domestic product spent on research and development across the 36 member countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) is 2.4 per cent, said Dr Andy Jones, speaking at Manufacturing Live. The UK spends around just 1.7 per cent.

“This country is a long way behind, and public funding in research and development is also lower than some other countries,” he added.

“The goal of the UK’s industrial strategy, launched in 2018, is to get the country’s investment in research and development up to the OECD average to drive productivity across industry.

“Just 400 companies carry out 75 per cent of all the UK’s research and development, but we have a fantastic engineering and manufacturing heritage and we need to build on that.”

Dr Jones urged delegates to consider whether they would benefit from government support to invest in research and development. “Think about what you do. Think about the challenges and the monies that are available. The government’s priorities are listed in the Industrial Strategy on the Innovate UK website.

“Our goal at Innovate UK is to boost jobs, growth and exports. We will generally match fund big companies’ investment in research and development and will often more than match fund investment made by smaller companies.

“There is money available now and the organisation best placed to help companies access funding is the Knowledge Transfer Network (KTN). This is Innovate UK’s network partner which also provides innovation networking for other funders. KTN links new ideas and opportunities with expertise, markets and finance through its network of businesses, universities, funders and investors.”

Behind the scenes at Spirax Sarco

The highlight of every Manufacturing Live is the factory tour. Delegates were accompanied around the Spirax Sarco factory in Cheltenham by key members of staff explaining the process from research and development through to design, manufacturing and distribution.

Spirax Sarco invests continually in product research and development. To manufacture new products and continue to speed up the manufacturing processes themselves, the company also commits significant capital expenditure to new processes and equipment.

Integrating new process equipment on to the factory floor, while embracing the new technology available to boost efficiency and maintain factory output, is a science in itself and the way that Spirax Sarco has achieved this is impressive. The company recently invested £2 million in a dedicated clean steam facility in Cheltenham and is investing more than £4 million a year to further upgrade its UK manufacturing facility, while also investing in its other eight manufacturing sites across the globe.

is impressive. The company recently invested £2 million

Business & Innovation Magazine organises two Manufacturing Live events every year. These bring company owners, production engineers and heads of manufacturing from businesses of all sizes across the region together at a host manufacturing company. This encourages collaboration between companies geographically close but which may not have met to encourage better communication and support wider innovation.